Monday, December 28, 2009

I seem to have dug myself into a hole.. Since commentary was added for each song of the previous entry, we have no choice but to continue this path, and to have it done sometime before Thursday. Let's do this..........

21 DJ Quik & Kurupt "9x Outta 10"Something tells me the brilliantly simple production in this was not an accident. DJ Quik's 2009 future-classic will fit in perfectly alongside such ass-kicking in-your-face 00's minimalism heard previously in "Grindin'," "Drop It Like It's Hot" and "Wait (The Whisper Song)."

22 Pill "Trap Goin’ Ham"I'd love to describe Pill's emergence onto the Atlanta hiphop scene as more of an "event," except no one in my circle of friends has any idea who this guy is. Hopefully, that will change in 2010 and beyond. Pill's 2 (brilliant) mixtapes from 2009 sound like the best elements of Ludacris, Lil Wayne and both dudes from Outkast all rolled up into one entity, except with far more urgency and freshness.

23 Tinted Windows "Kind Of A Girl"Tinted Windows seemed like an odd grouping initially. However, looking further into the matter, Fountains Of Wayne and Cheap Trick used to often play shows with Smashing Pumpkins back in the Mellon Collie days, and the Hanson dudes seem willing to collaborate with pretty much anyone who has basic rock-cred. Buzz was unavoidable simply based on their "supergroup" status, and so their success entirely rested on whether Adam Schlesinger could create another one of his huge-sounding catchy-as-all-fuck brain-penetration-machines like "Stacy's Mom" or The Click Five's "Just A Girl," which unfortunately did not happen. But although it wasn't as huge and accessible, "Kind Of A Girl" was the best single from any supergroup in 2009, far surpassing the attempts from Them Crooked Vultures and The Dead Weather (and of course who could forget the abysmal Chickenfoot).

24 Phoenix "Lisztomania"This year's 2 big singles from Phoenix finally earned these guys some long overdue popularity in the United States, along with earning them a boatload in commercial licensing. The only slight bummer is that 2006's It's Never Been Like That was one of those rare albums from the past few years where all 10 songs were kinda outstanding, while this year's flawed Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix ended up getting all the credit.

25 Neon Indian "Should’ve Taken Acid With You"The most prevalent memory I personally kept from Summer 2009 is that it rained about 75% of the time, so weather-wise, we barely received a summer. But music-wise, there seemed to be more summery sounding pop songs than any of the past few years. And it didn't seem uncommonly bizarre for them to continue getting released into late-August and September of this year.

Pitchfork said: The side effects [are] so literal and innocent-- going swimming, ditching your parents, watching the cosmos, making out-- that it could just as easily have been called "Should've Tried to Hold Your Hand."

26 Clipse featuring Kanye West "Kinda Like A Big Deal"Possibly Kanye's best guest-spot of the year. The beat is so groove-a-tron that baffling lyrics such as "plus she got that dumb ass" or the (possibly Snorg Tees quoting) title lyric become instantly forgivable.

27 Raekwon featuring Ghostface Killah "Penitentiary"Thanks to tracks like this one, it became clear that the hype surrounding Only Built 4 Cuban Linx Part 2 wasn't simply built around nostalgia. This album along with Fishscale shows The Wu finally soaring past the bumpy turbulence in the aftermath of Ol' Dirty Bastard.

28 Drake "Best I Ever Had"I refuse to watch Drake's videos as I fear the suave charm in his music will be drastically undermined by recognizing him as the same guy who played a paraplegic basketball player on Degrassi: The Next Generation, the most horrifically compelling TV show intended for pre-teens since 1990 gave us the 1-2 punch of Saved By The Bell and Nickelodeon's Fifteen. And don't let the "rapping" fool any listeners... This shit was made for American Top 40 with just as much pop craftsmanship as Lady GaGa.

29 Dinosaur Jr "Whenever You’re Ready"Dude... It's Dinosaur Jr covering The Zombies. And not only that, but they killed it, and the song was awesome to begin with. There was no way in hell this wasn't going to make the top 30 of this list, almost entirely based upon principle.

30 The Hood Internet "Comfortable Up Here" (Lil Wayne vs Royksopp)I have to admit I don't know very much about this one... I hadn't heard either of the original songs before hearing this mash-up. But whatever works...

31 Superdrag "Everything’ll Be Made Right"Although they have yet to surpass "Sucked Out," Superdrag consistently pump out a few killer tracks on every album they've released since, this one being their 2009 highlight.

32 Silversun Pickups "The Royal We"There is hope for straight-up rock in 2010 and beyond. Silversun was recently nominated for a well-deserved "Best New Artist" Grammy. It's unfortunate that Muse blew up the instant they decided to release their worst album ever. If Silversun didn't seem like such nice guys (and girl), I'd encourage them to push Muse off the stage during their next high-profile TV appearance and break into either this song or "Panic Switch."

33 Kid CuDi featuring Kanye West & Common "Make Her Say"Common's buzzkill verse at the end prevented "Make Her Say" from placing a lot higher, but the drums are too good to keep it from falling too low. Without the drums, this would've been "that weird song where they sampled Lady GaGa to make some quick cash."

34 Kid CuDi "Sky Might Fall"If he knows what's good for him, Kid CuDi should prolly have sent a Christmas card out to Kanye this year.

35 Dinosaur Jr "Your Weather"Lou Barlow also released a solo album this year with some classic melancholy Sebadoh-sounding stuff. But nothing beats hearing one of Lou's best recent songs performed with the full force of The Dinosaur.

36 Ryan Leslie "Diamond Girl"The world needs more post-Neptunes R&B. I had no idea that this single was actually released late 2007, but it's the lead track off his self-titled full-length which was released in February of this year.

37 Doves "Compulsion"Apparently, Doves are still around. This track was floating around Sirius 26's playlist over the summer, from what's probably their best album since Lost Souls in 2000.

38 A Place To Bury Strangers "In Your Heart"It's not everyday a modern band figures out how to tweak their sound to authentically channel a specific era of music. Either that, or they stumbled upon some outtakes from a long-lost and awesomely loud UK shoegaze band circa 1990.

39 Blitzen Trapper "Preacher’s Sister’s Boy"A B-side from the Black River Killer EP, I was unable to find it anywhere on Youtube or elsewhere online, and so instead the audio file below links to "God + Suicide," which is the sister-track to "Preacher's Sister's Boy," as they're very similar in style and both are under 2:20. I'm about 68% certain we'll hear a new Blitzen Trapper album in 2010.

40 New Boyz "You’re A Jerk"If one-hit-wonders existed anymore, this one would have fit in just fine. If you hate fun (a.k.a. if you're a jerk), don't bother to fuck with "You're A Jerk." If this becomes the template for a new genre called "skinny-jeans rap," I will have zero complaints. Did you learn how to jerk yet?

Saturday, December 26, 2009

I'll try adding some commentary this time around.. Mostly personal opinion stuff.. Prolly the type of commentary I will eventually regret writing, but whatever.. We need some content.

41 Animal Collective "Bluish""My Girls" and "Summertime Clothes" were instantly catchy, but the rest of the album took a few listens before really starting to fully understand this aura. "Bluish" was the moment when I decided that I could fuck with Merriweather Post Pavillion. ...cascading treetops caressing a blue skyline, and floating.. always floating...

42 Drake "Successful"Taste My Kids "guilty pleasures" list might not happen this year, or at least not one with commentary, but this will be there.. The guilt is mostly derived from the lyrics in Trey Songz chorus, literally translated to the following: "I want the money, the money and the cars, cars and the clothes, the hoes, I suppose, I just wanna be, I just wanna be successful." LMAO. The pleasure mostly lies in the production.. Good choices with these keyboard patches.

43 Junior Boys "Hazel"I've crossed paths with many people in 2009 who were randomly pumping this song from their laptops. As far as I can tell, Junior Boys's 3rd record is their least consistent, although "Hazel" deserves a spot on their eventual greatest hits album.

44 Sufjan Stevens "There’s Too Much Love"You couldn't ask for a more exciting preview for the Illinoise follow-up, which STILL has no release date (and don't hold your breath throughout 2010...) But when it does happen, we'll be damn good and ready. For now, the only way to hear this song is through live Youtube videos.

45 Phoenix "Girlfriend"This is another one of those that makes me nostalgic for six months ago.. Also, call me crazy for this, but the original mix from the "leaked" version of Wolfgang is slightly superior, which I'm pretty sure is the mix linked here...

46 Kid CuDi "Day N Nite (Nightmare)"This one is all production, as the lyrics are kinda on the wack side of the fence. But try not to let the production hypnotize yo dumb ass. You'll fall into a trance.

47 Sufjan Stevens "You Are The Blood"If it were up to me, every thesaurus in the world should now somehow include this song as a new synonym for "epic."

48 Das Racist vs Wallpaper "Combination Pizza Hut And Taco Bell"NOT the best "remix" job of 2009, but possibly the best improvement upon its nearly unlistenable original version, since the joke becomes infinitely more tolerable, and actually starts to generate some genuine lulz. However, the "fire in the disco/fire in the TACO BELL" comparisons become that much more questionable now that tenor saxophones have been included. (Overplayed? Almost. I'm actually happy this song didn't blow up on commercial radio. I could go a month without hearing it at this point.)

49 Dinosaur Jr "Over It"A great song that became better in part because of its video.. It's hard to tell if the band members are still friends, or if this recent Dinosaur Jr reunion thing is just a case of a few dudes putting aside their differences to make some extra cash. Either way, it gave us one of the best albums of the past few years.

50 Yeah Yeah Yeahs "Heads Will Roll"Holy crap, this band has improved vastly. I hope they continue this "synth" phase into their next few albums, because this is the Yeah Yeah Yeahs I was hoping they would be based on all the 2003-era hype.

51 The Brontosaur "One"The chord progression in this one sounds a little like "Weeds" from Pulp's We Love Life LP, which is definitely a good thing. I seem to be the only person I know who loves this album, and I'm trying my best to push it onto people through mix CD's & my radio shift, etc, etc.. There's always room for straight-up guitar-rock, especially when the drums are this sick. (Big up's to Kellii Scott.)| Full album on MySpace |

52 The Flaming Lips "Worm Mountain"Distorted stoner bass. Oh HELL yeah. A friend described this album to me as "claustrophobic" which seems like a spot-on term here. Something tells me these dudes were starting to get tired of pressing the "confetti" button during their live shows, and this is by far their most refreshing change of direction since The Soft Bulletin.

53 Taylor Swift "Forever And Always"White chicks LOL. Is this really country? If so, this is the best country song of the past 20 years, which is weird because I just read that this was possibly written about one of the Jonas Brothers. I have no desire to pay attention to Taylor Swift's lyrics, so the celebrity gossip attached to this song is meaningless to me. (Also I just read that Jonas Brothers' publicist forbade interviewers from having reporters ask them about the South Park episode where Mickey Mouse kicks their asses and refers to them as "you piece of shit".)

54 Passion Pit "The Reeling"In the process of trying to get that "authentic 80's" sound, a lot of bands have recently been (seemingly) accidentally coming up with some great singles, this being one of them.

55 Grizzly Bear "While You Wait For The Others"Good album.. I like all the songs.. and yet I'm still not completely feeling the hype. I'm just mostly tired of music that sounds like this. The bands who are currently writing most of the best songs are unfortunately also among those who have forgotten that they have a pair of nads. And it really only takes a slight adjustment to turn up that nad-dial.. (For example, take a listen to what The Hood Internet did with "Two Weeks." Maybe I'm crazy here, but is def an improvement from the original.) Moving on... "While You Wait For The Others," while emasculated, is still a 2009 classic.

56 Clipse "All Eyes On Me"Sick beat. It's a shame Til The Casket Drops was unable to maintain the strong momentum of Lord Willin' and Hell Hath No Fury, but at least a handful of their newer songs are still fresh.

57 Pill "Dimes Of Hard"I couldn't find "Dimes Of Hard" anywhere to stream online, so instead this links to "Glass" from Pill's more recent mixtape, 4075: The Refill. "Dimes Of Hard" samples Ryan Leslie's "Diamond Girl" and is equally as good as the original.

58 The Pains Of Being Pure At Heart "Contender"I'm really happy about this shoegaze-revival thing. Where Autolux and Silversun Pickups took the route cleared by My Bloody Valentine, bands like The Ravonettes and The Pains Of Being Pure At Heart (while unfortunately named) have been enjoying the journey previously traveled by The Jesus And Mary Chain.

59 Ne-Yo "Mad"Fingers are crossed for a new Ne-Yo album in 2010.. "Mad" was a Spring 2009 single from his previous record.

60 Washed Out "Feel It All Around"This is a rare case where I felt nostalgia the first time I heard a song... In this case, it somehow pulled me back to the Napster days. I've concluded that this is not a common opinion, but it sounds like something I would have downloaded from Napster, after reading that it was included on the NME's 50 best singles of 2000 or 2001.

It was announced earlier today that Rage Against The Machine's "Killing In The Name" (the most overplayed song from one of the best albums of the 90's) is now the #1 song in the UK due to a Facebook campaign that was designed by a few BBC Radio One DJ's who didn't want the UK version of American Idol to score a "Christmas #1."

As I read further into this matter, the following factors seem to have played a part:

#1 On December 4th, Rage re-released "Killing In The Name" as an iTunes download with the proceeds going to some form of charity.

#2 It would appear that the winner of the show X Factor (the UK Idol of which Simon Cowell is either the show's host or a judge of some sort) has achieved "Christmas #1's" for the past 5 years. I'm still unable to understand why the #1 song during the week of Christmas is a big deal in the UK, but to each his own.. It's a big enough deal that it made headlines...

#3 Shortly after the BBC campaign launched, Tom Morello announced that Rage supports this campaign as a "wonderful dose of anarchy." Dave Grohl, Liam from Prodigy, McCartney, and the guys from Muse encouraged their fans to purchase the download as well.

#4 Earlier today, BBC announced this as the first download-only single to reach #1.

If this were a U.S. thing, Ellen DeGeneres would have probably devoted an entire week of her show trying to get her viewers to out-buy the Rage downloads. But that's neither here nor there...

It seems like I would've cared more if this happened 5 or 6 years ago, or if it was a U.S. #1 instead.. However, one thing for certain is that the UK charts don't lie, unlike American Idol, which was proven by the Sanjaya campaign of Spring 2007 (or TRL for that matter, who always lied about their results, proven by numerous events such as the campaign for New Kids On The Block's "Hangin' Tough" in March 1999). So in a way, Rage's #1 is quite gratifying, and perhaps a signifier of American Idol's impending and long overdue fall in popularity.

Saturday, December 12, 2009

2009 was really a fantastic year for shitty, terrible radio singles. 1991 was probably the last time commercial radio suffered so horribly, partially due to the current trend of songs getting sold primarily due to their blatant sexual elements. The last time this trend really took off was between 1990 and 1991 (the 2 year period that gave us "Cherry Pie," "I Wanna Sex You Up," "Let's Talk About Sex," "I Touch Myself," "Do Me," "Me So Horny," "I'm Too Sexy," and the videos for Chris Isaac's "Wicked Game" and Billy Idol's "Rock The Cradle Of Love"). Obviously, this wasn't the only time sex showed up in song lyrics or was suggested through production elements, but it was the last time that subtlety meant truly nothing. And now 17 years later, we're pretty much back at that same cycle point. Only now it seems that mainstream subtlety may truly be dead, never to return. It sure is taking a while for that engine to turn over.

The other big shitty radio trend of the past year was "party anthems," the majority of which also incorporate blatant sexual overtones, often times alongside references to drinking and getting high. The following were the worst examples of how mainstream radio responded to these trends...

#20 Cobra Starship "Good Girls Go Bad"I'll have to make a personal note about this one, as it's one of the rare cases of my entire life when a song played on the radio actually caused literal stomach pain, due to the short and odd little vibrato bits scattered throughout this mess. Sharp, stabbing pains. I was NOT happy.| Youtube |

#18 Jadakiss "Who’s Real"The same guy who once sang "Why is Jadakiss as hard as it gets?" shit out one of the most annoying attempts to cash in on "keeping it real" ever released to radio. I'm sure the irony has been made painfully obvious to all the rappers involved by now.| Youtube |

#17 Millionaires "I Love Money"Millionaires were quoted in a 2008 interview stating "We’re showing kids that anyone can do this." Yes, this is correct.. Any talentless 16-year-old idiot can take 30 seconds out of their life to scribble out the first "naughty" lyrics that pop into their head, and then press "play" on a drum machine and sing-talk into a microphone. Oh wait a sec, they're reasonably attractive teenage sluts who sing about partying? If I owned a label, I'd have signed them too. Just throw them on the Warped Tour.. The people willing to actually pay to see that mess will literally eat any pile of shit you throw in front of them. It's easy money.| Youtube |

#16 Pitbull "I Know You Want Me (Calle Ocho)"Worst video of 2009.. seriously, this video looks like it cost about $15. It's the music video equivalent of this album cover.| Youtube |

#15 Next Stop Mars "HxPorn"I can accept crunkcore, as long as I can accept denial itself: Oh boy! Crunkcore! Something new! So many song elements I've never heard performed quite in this way before!! And I've especially not heard them in every other hardcore band that's ever existed. And certainly never with sunglasses and fucking horribly gross haircuts. "HxPorn" is so catchy and timeless that it's truly a wonder these assholes haven't blown up yet. It's great to know that music really took some big steps forward in 2009. Next Stop Mars makes me so proud of our fair nation and not suicidal at all. That bottle of poison over there on the shelf is totally not staring at me right now. Nope! Not at all. | Youtube |

#14 BrokeNCYDE "Freaxx"I heard that Dick Cheney is a huge fan of BrokeNCYDE and that he specifically requested this song to be pumped from ghetto blasters on an endless loop while the CIA was waterboarding al-Qaeda suspects. Whoever said torture doesn't work?| Youtube |

#13 Karl Wolf "Africa"I feel embarrassed for this guy.. He sampled Toto's "Africa" as the chorus to a slow-down reggaeton track, apparently unaware that slowed-down reggaeton is no longer marketable for Top 40 radio. And I'm sure he thought this song was gonna be huge. LOL.| Youtube |

#12 Flo Rida "Right Round"Apparently, this is the correct way to sample an 80's hit in 2009, since "Right Round" did climb to #1 last Spring. Karl Wolf should've taken a note from Flo Rida. It's usually best to slightly alter the lyrics of the sampled song so that they're about receiving fellatio, and then have some random girl sing the second half of the chorus with altered lyrics about giving fellatio. And then tie the whole thing together with some verses that sound like you're taking a shit. | Youtube |

#11 Kristina Debarge "Goodbye"Huge trend for 2009: Sampling Steam's "Na Na Hey Hey Kiss Him Goodbye." Well okay, maybe not a HUGE trend, but I'm pretty sure Jay-Z's "D.O.A." and Wale's "Chillin'" were released within the same month as "Goodbye." At the time, it sure seemed like an odd coincidence. Also, "Goodbye" is now probably the 2nd worst radio song to ever use the now overexposed drumbeat stolen from Rhianna's "S.O.S."| Youtube |

#10 Britney Spears "If You Seek Amy"And by happy coincidence, we end up here.. Probably the worst radio single to ever steal the now overexposed "S.O.S." drumbeat (which is actually the same drums from Gary Glitter's "Rock And Roll Part 2" but that's a 70's song.. nobody remembers..). Max Martin hit a homerun with "I Kissed A Girl" and Britney got all pissy that he didn't give the song to her, so she was all like "write me something that sounds like that" and this was the best they could come up with.*| Youtube |*This might not be true.

#09 Asher Roth "I Love College"Asher Roth is a white rapper, in case anyone didn't notice. And also he write songs about drinking beer in college, as opposed to a white rapper like Bubba Sparxx who writes about the Dirty South. So obviously, Asher Roth is the next Eminem. I mean, come on.. They have so much in common. I mean... they're both white, right? And.. they both appeal to frat kids. Eminem wrote plenty of verses just like this one: "I love college. It's where you get your knowledge. You wake up, go to class, skip class, drink a beer, get drunk, skip a class, shoot up, go to class, get drunk, get high, get fucked up." I mean, come on.. It's like Slim Shady 2.0.

P.S. Mad props to Rivers Cuomo. Despite being bat-fucking-crazy, Rivers was still able to pull together enough sense to refuse licensing "Say It Ain't So" as the sample for "I Love College," which is probably the only cool thing he's done in the past 7 years.| Youtube |

#08 3Oh!3 "Starstrukk"I ALREADY TOLD YOU THEYRE THE PRODUCT OF SATAN AND I DO NOT FEEL LIKE REPEATING MYSELF TODAY. P.S. I have solid confirmation that these 2 dudes are baby molesters and should be locked up somewhere far, far away where they won't be able to hurt anymore harmless little babies. | Youtube |

#07 Dolly Rockers "Je Suis Une Dolly"This is actually a happy story, as I've read this group was already dropped from their label due to poor sales, and they clearly have no shot of achieving success in the United States, so they won't be getting signed over here. There is a God afterall.| Youtube |

#06 Dan Black "HYPNTZ"Seriously, is there a bigger tool than Dan Black anywhere on this green planet? I heard that around the time "HYPNTZ" was released, Biggy Smalls actually came back from the dead, just so he could shoot himself. | Youtube |

#05 Seether "Careless Whisper"I like that one part that's like "REERERRRRREREERRRRERRRRRRRR."| Youtube |

#04 Ke$ha "TiK ToK"Simply insufferable. This shit barely merits a review. How did this not make #1? ... Okay, so according to Wikipedia, it states that Ke$ha once broke into Prince's house because she was desperate to give him her mixtape CD, and she actually ended up passing it along to Prince, just before she got thrown out. I guess that's kinda cool.. although I'm not surprised he passed on it. Even that Carmen Electra album was better than this.|Youtube |

#03 Hollywood Undead "Everywhere I Go"Thank God, these guys showed up just in time.. It's been a little too long since some more shit-sandwiches about drinking and partying and smoking weed had fallen out of some Juggalos asses. Yeah, you read correctly. Juggalos figured out how to get signed. Which means their list of influences include one artist: ICP. It's pretty much as bad as you would expect. They even wear masks instead of face paint. Yuck.| Youtube |

#02 Millionaires "Just Got Paid Let’s Get Laid"December 21, 2012 can't come fast enough. Just kill us all please. We're just wasting here. There's no point in our civilization continuing to destroy the planet. Hey, maybe by 2012, Millionaires will actually be millionaires. How about that. Hm.| Youtube |

#01 Cage The Elephant "Ain’t No Rest For The Wicked"I've been at it for the past hour, watching these Youtube clips and reviewing these terrible, terrible songs.. Every other year I've pretty much just posted the worst 20 songs and left it at that, but I decided to try something different this time around. And now, moving from Millionaires to Cage The Elephant, and trying to describe how hopeless I feel.. It's really just meaningless. These songs have achieved in sucking my happiness straight out of me. And no song sucked in 2009 like "Ain't No Rest For The Wicked." Like, holy fucking shit this song sucks. It's worse than that song The Rock did. Judge for yourself.| Youtube |

Friday, December 11, 2009

If MTV still existed (in its classic form), it's possible "Trap Goin' Ham" could do what "Nuthin' But A G Thing" did for west coast gangsta rap in 1993. This is true grit, with so many brilliantly rugged and real images. It's the genuine dirty south in its purest form. Apparently, this video was SO real, that at least one gentleman threatened the camera crew with a swinging florescent lightbulb. Craziest video shoot ever?

Thursday, December 10, 2009

It's been brought to my attention that full or partial frontal nudity has become a recent trend in pop videos, perhaps as a result of music videos no longer requiring permission from MTV programmers before becoming popular. I haven't actually seen the videos, but I've been told t.A.T.u., Girls, and The Flaming Lips have all been "letting it all hang out" so to speak.. So it shouldn't have been a complete surprise that Rammstein decided to throw their inhibitions out the window entirely and go down (huh-huh-huh go down) as possibly the first well known rock band to have all six band members (huh-huh-huh member) whipping off the towel once and for all. Something tells me Marilyn Manson is super-pissed he didn't think of this first. And much like Manson (and Tool for that matter), Rammstein seems to be repeatedly misunderstood as a band who takes themselves way too seriously, when in reality, nothing could be farther from the truth.

P.S. My favorite shot is around 2:58... Standing in front of the flag.. the big important speech to the adoring country of followers...

Okay, torturing this poor little kid is kinda uncool. I'm sure most of us have a similar reaction while watching this video.. But here's the thing. I feel for this kid, because my parents used to pull the same bullshit with me because they thought it was funny. They think I forgot that stuff 25 years later, but I haven't. There was some black lady on the cover of TV Guide that I thought was scary, and so instead of hiding the picture, they use it to play games with me and challenge my fear threshold, just for their own amusement. Or after I saw the "Thriller" video for the first time.. I literally ran out of the room screaming. I may as well have pissed myself in fear. This was at my grandparents house, where they had cable. But back home, I was protected by the safety of no cable TV connections. However, that didn't stop my dad from trying to impersonate Michael Jackson's cat eyes by lifting his eyebrows and looking down, so that only the whites were visible, not unlike the eyes from Evil Dead 2. This normally would get me screaming and running away as fast as I could. And it affected my dreams, as I recall waking up around age 4 from a dream when my mom was possessed with only whites in her eyes and a big scary smile on her face. It was horrifying. This shit fucks kids up. I'm living proof, goddamnit.

But in the case of "Kids," it was for the sake of art, so yeah.. Good video. He'll get over it.

In addition to directing arguably his most shocking video to date with Rammstein's "Pussy," Jonas Åkerlund also spent part of 2009 directing "Paparazzi," arguably his most iconic video since Prodigy's "Smack My Bitch Up," making Jonas a ripe candidate for 2009's "pop video director of the year." "Iconic" is really a perfect word to describe this video not only for Jonas, but more obviously for Lady GaGa. If "Poker Face" didn't make it obvious that she means business, "Paparazzi" went and smacked a bitch up like a champagne bottle across the face. Also, let's not forget dancing wheelchair/crutches and the "fuck you" mugshots at the end. This is some brilliant shit right here.

Gather around friends.. Come see Jack White and that chick from The Kills engaging in the most disturbingly realistic gun shootout since the final 2 minutes of Bonnie & Clyde.. only this time they don't die, and at the end you can see the sunlight shining through their bullet holes, which is actually far more disturbing than if they had just shot themselves to death.

Like the antithesis of Pill's "Trap Goin' Ham," this is a whole different story about street life in the Dirty South. I'd explain further, but I may just end up spoiling the fun.. LMAO X 111111110000000000000000000

Time for some suburban warzones, explosions, blood, running, driving, more explosions, and more running.. In the end, it all looks suspiciously similar to the rap video version of Children Of Men. But it fits the song well enough to place it among the year's best.

Eric Wareheim from Tim & Eric continues using his bizarre editing and directing methods just as he had done in the past for videos from The Bird And The Bee and more recently for Major Lazer. The bizarre qualities are still intact for Eric's treatment of MGMT, but the melancholy atmosphere of "The Youth" gives the images a level of slight poignancy unseen in his previous videos. ("Slight" meaning 10% poignant & 90% lulz..)

Honorable mention goes to Beyoncé's "Single Ladies (Put A Ring On It)" which certainly will go down in history as the most ubiquitous and inescapable pop video of 2009, and became iconic enough that Beyoncé's next three videos were pretty much exactly the same concept. Congratulations to Miss Knowles for continuing to remain relevant in the ever increasingly fickle world of pop culture and by doing so with such a simple video.

Maura Johnston and Christopher R. Weingarten have started posting their mostly on-target "50 Worst Songs Of The 00's" list in their Village Voice blog. It's kind of difficult to figure out how to navigate through the entire thing, but if you feel like checking it out here's the link.

Included at #25 is "Heart Songs," the final cut from Weezer's 3rd self-titled album (nicknamed by Weezer themselves as "The Red Album"). Maladroit is the last Weezer LP I've heard in full, so this was my first listen through "Heart Songs." It's quite unfortunately a new snake-like low for Rivers Cuomo, as difficult as this may be to perceive seeing as how "We Are All On Drugs" wasn't just a bad dream. I never imagined a band could break my heart in the way that Weezer has.

Monday, December 7, 2009

Usually Taste My Kids holds off on "best of the year" festivities until January, but there are several reasons why it's coming super early this year..

1. 2009 albums were such a tearful bummer that there doesn't seem to be much point in waiting any longer. If anything truly outstanding shows up between now and January 1st, throwing it into the "best of 2010" list shouldn't make a huge difference since it will be mostly enjoyed next year anyway. (Singles and album tracks were great as always, and so "best songs" will be up in January.)

2. The "90's guilty pleasure singles" list that's been sitting around for the past 2 years needs to finally see the light of day sometime soon, and getting "best of the year" stuff out of the way now will make room for starting this as early as next week.

So a few of the 2009 lists will possibly be posted as early as later this afternoon. "30 nice albums" and "20 worst songs" will likely be up within the next week. "10 guilty pleasure singles" and "10 roffles" will be up during December. "60 best songs" and "12 best movies" will be up in January. Don't expect much content this year. 2009 music was not incredibly inspiring.

And depending on the excitement levels, the HUGE "90's guilty pleasure singles" feature might begin later this week.

Tuesday, December 1, 2009

The decade-end feature concludes tonight with various amazing music clips from TV. "Best TV Clips" are able to say enough that it's not really necessary to post any "albums of the decade" or anything along those lines.. So this is gonna do it for the Taste My Kids decade-end wrap-up.

Honorable mentions go out to pregnant M.I.A. pictured here at the Grammy Awards in February 2009, and bleeding Lady GaGa pictured here at the VMA's in August 2009, neither of which were available to post as videos here, sadly.

Radiohead "The National Anthem" on SNL (October 14, 2000)I could only find a clip for this on some Japanese video hosting place. Just a warning, if you happen to press "pause" mid-video it shows you an ad for Hewlett-Packard. This is the future, people.

at.the.drive.in "Quarantine" on Channel V (March 27, 2001)

...And You Will Know Us By The Trail Of Dead "Relative Ways" on Letterman (June 20, 2002)This is mostly noteworthy since they are possibly the only band to give Letterman the finger to his face prior to leaving the stage.

Andrew WK "Medley: "Tear It Up," "Party Hard," "Ready To Die" on Spike TV Video Game Awards (December 4, 2003)Easy #1 for best TV performance of the decade. We're a better world because of AWK.

System Of A Down "B.Y.O.B." on SNL (May 7, 2005)Mostly noteworthy since the guitar player screamed "FUCK YOU!" on uncensored network TV. I guess SNL is live afterall. ("BYOB" was not able to be found for stream anywhere online, but some German site has "Aerials" up, which is better than nothing.)

Dinosaur Jr "Forget The Swan" on The Henry Rollins Show (June 24, 2006)

Monday, November 30, 2009

Oh.. my.. god.. I can't believe no one ever told me this existed. This is one of the most amazing things I've ever fucking seen. I'm not kidding.

Shit starts getting real around 2:30 when a "trading 8's" guitar solo marathon starts up.. and sadly it's one of the most boring guitar solos I've ever heard in my life. And then shit gets the most real around 6:12 when the snapshots close out this mighty mammoth.

Sunday, November 29, 2009

Now here's the deal, see.. Muxtape was way 2008 and I miss it to death, so I found another resource that is similar, but not as good. It's called "8tracks," and I was under the assumption that mixes could only be 8 songs long, but they let me upload 30, so I figured what the hell.. 30 songs from 2009 that I am recommending. You can listen while you clean your room or masturbate or whatever. Here's the link..

One thing that's weird about 8track.com is that the order is chosen randomly after you listen to the mix once through. I tried to think of a good order anyway.. It kicks off with the new Animal Collective song that now famously includes "the first ever officially licensed Grateful Dead sample" or whatever. I don't normally go apeshit over AC, but JEEZ.. This new one is hypnotic x 99999. Planning on meditating soon? This might help.

Elsewhere in the mix are lots of recent hiphop tracks, including this southern dude Pill who deserves to blow up in 2010.. Towards the end are album tracks from Taylor Swift and Lady GaGa which I guilty pleasure love.. And somewhere in the middle is that epic, brilliant, amazing Sufjan Stevens track off the Dark Was The Night comp. The rest are all surprises.. mostly stuff I listen to a lot in my car.

Wednesday, November 25, 2009

Continuing with our series, tonight we enter the spectrum of "scripted" TV clips, a subjective term considering how improvisation likely played a part in the majority of these. One point worth noting: Taste My Kids vastly prefers Comedy TV to Drama TV for many reasons, so the "spectrum" in this case is actually not all that inclusive. Most of the best clips from drama shows are best enjoyed while watching an entire episode anyway, whereas comedy clips can easily be explained or taken out of context and still enjoyed.

If drama were included, Edgar's death scene in Season 5 of 24 would have made the cut, since it's one of the saddest things ever shown on TV. But there's no Youtube clip. So it's not very useful here.

Law And Order: SVU deserves special inclusion as well since every episode seems so dense with story and has consistently remained one of the darkest shows on network TV. (It's a show centered around the theme of sexual assault, so I don't see how this point is debatable.) However, choosing a best moment from SVU is kind of impossible and pointless, and there are hardly any good Youtube clips anyway.

Also not on Youtube: Freaks And Geeks. A personal favorite episode of mine is the first one I ever saw from January 2000, where Sam, Neil and Bill befriend the "new girl" and bring her along to shoot off model rockets, while Lindsay and her freak friends visit Jason Schwartzman at his retail store to inquire about purchasing horribly made fake ID's. Brilliant lolz, melancholy, nerdier than Weezer, awkward teenage storytelling at its finest.. Freaks And Geeks is possibly the best TV show of the decade. But unfortunately, there's no clips available on the internet.

Dexter headbutting Doakes is on Youtube, however, and it fucking rules, so we'll just post this now before shit gets official..

Dexter: Kicking some ass (November 11, 2007)So here's the thing.. I'm unable to bring myself to embed this video or other "drama" clips, since most of them technically count as spoilers for those who haven't seen the show. But here's the link for anyone who wants to know what some good non-comedy TV looks like:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l2OEmZFRxvA

Moving on, here's some of "scripted" TV's most amazing moments...

The Office (UK): Dancing for Charity (October 28, 2002)

Sealab 2021: Bizarro (November 17, 2002)Full episode available at livevideo.com.Youtube has the full episode in Spanish, which I guess is better than nothing...

Curb Your Enthusiasm: Tourette's Chef (November 17, 2002)

Arrested Development: A Magician Named Gob (January 4, 2004)

Chappelle’s Show: Rick James (February 11, 2004)"Making The Band" is still the best Chappelle's Show sketch, which would have been posted instead except the only Youtube clip has highly distorted sound. Anyway, here's some Rick James...

Wonder Showzen: Patience (April 25, 2005)If this were a countdown list, this would have probably made it to #1. It's a great world afterall when something like this can make it onto primetime MTV. And if your patience is actually strong enough to sit through 60 seconds of ads, here's the full episode at MTV.com.

Wonder Showzen: Horse Apples (May 12, 2006)Wonder Showzen clips are hard to find on Youtube, but luckily the full episode titled Mathematics is currently available at livevideo.com. It's definitely worth 20 minutes of your life.

Tim And Eric Awesome Show Great Job!: Lazy Horse Mattress And Bedding Supply (March 25, 2007)Better than anything Will Forte's done on SNL...

South Park: Imaginationland (October 17, 24, & 31, 2007)Probably the best thing Trey and Matt have ever done... and the DVD set with all 3 episodes strung together as a 70 minute movie is even better. There's no South Park on Youtube, so here's the official Season 11 link: http://www.southparkstudios.com/guide/season/11/

what's it?

TASTE MY KIDS compiles recommendations for a happier and healthier existence, most often in the form of "best-of" lists, youtube posts, album or movie reviews, and various scribblings. We lived on Geocities starting in August 2000. In January 2009, times got tough and posts were on hiatus until a new host could be located. Geocities eventually died anyway, and now we live on blogspot. True story.